§9. "Gesta Romanorum;" John de Bromyarde; "The Childhood of Jesus". XVII. Later Transition English. Vol. 1. From the Beginnings to the Cycles of Romance. The Cambridge History of English and American Literature: An Encyclopedia in Eighteen Volumes. 1907

The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
Volume I. From the Beginnings to the Cycles of Romance.

XVII. Later Transition English.

§ 9. Gesta Romanorum; John de Bromyarde; The Childhood of Jesus.

Of the two collections of stories referred to above, one, the most famous of its kind, and the source-book for many later English writers, the Gesta Romanorum, probably took shape in England, in its Latin form, in the period under discussion. Early preachers and homilists were only too willing to seize hold of stories from every quarter in order to “point the moral,” and their collections have served many ends different from the purpose designed. If the “moral” attached to each tale, and dragged in, often, on the most flimsy excuse, be ignored, the tales of the Gesta Romanorum become readable, for they are often excellently, even though baldly, told.